


Picking up the pieces

by faust_carlotta



Category: Avatar: Legend of Korra
Genre: Canon Compliant, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, F/F, Grief/Mourning, Loss, Post-Canon, Somewhere in between the end of the battle and the end of the series, let's give people time to cry
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-20
Updated: 2020-12-20
Packaged: 2021-03-10 22:28:32
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,051
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28194711
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/faust_carlotta/pseuds/faust_carlotta
Summary: After the battle against Kuvira is won, Asami has to look her own grief in the eyes.
Relationships: Korra & Asami Sato, Korra/Asami Sato
Comments: 4
Kudos: 45





	Picking up the pieces

**Author's Note:**

> Not your usual korrasami, I guess. This is a fic is more about feelings and crying and grief and other ugly stuff - just because it bothered me how quickly and easily Asami got over everything (give a girl some emotional depth, will ya).  
> You have been warned.
> 
> (I'm not a native english speaker, don't be cruel)

It was a warm summer evening and Republic City, painted in the last auburn sun rays and caressed by a soft and temperate breeze, had never been so quiet. Even though the war had been over for days, the population had not come completely back yet, especially not near the new portal, where the destruction had been worse than in any other area. The only people who came to that place were merely the construction workers in charge of rebuilding whatever was salvageable, so, in the evening, when they left the sites to go home in the outskirts, the city centre would be almost entirely abandoned – if it wasn’t for a few shy spirits peeking from the new portal.  
It was in that moment, in the almost complete absence of sound, that Korra realised how accustomed she had become of the rumble of the cars and the racket of the metropolis she was so confused by at the beginning of her career as the new Avatar. She remembered how she and Naga used to skedaddle through the streets, dazzled by all the life, all the light and all the noises, like little children. She used to be so excited and overwhelmed by it, she hadn’t been able to sleep at first. And now, after everything that had happened, it was all so quiet. The only thing Korra could hear was the faint high-pitched buzzing in her ears, from the aftermath of the battle that had not completely faded yet.  
As she strolled around the deserted streets alongside her large white polar dog, Korra walked by the debris of the buildings that had been damaged by Kuvira’s enormous mecha-suit, just a couple days before; it almost looked like all the rubble lying around had been there for centuries, like ancient ruins consumed by a lifetime, and yet it just had been a few suns and moons. The Avatar couldn’t help but thinking how little time it had taken to destroy so many people’s homes and lives. In such a short amount of time, so much had happened. So much had changed.  
They defeated Kuvira. The portal was created. Mako got hurt. Varrick and Zhu Li got engaged. The war had ended. Hiroshi Sato, Asami’s dad, was killed.  
And it only took a couple hours, thought Korra, to change everything permanently.  
She gave out a huge sigh and buried her hands in her pockets, while she looked up to the sky and caught a glimpse of the yellow tilted roof of the Future Industries Tower, one of the only buildings that had miraculously survived the clash with the mecha-suit. With the tip of her shoe Korra kicked a little rock aside, following its trajectory with her blue eyes, while losing herself in the stream of her own thoughts which always and inevitably led to one person.  
\----  
Asami had not been home for three days.  
Mako’s grandmother told her as she stopped by the Sato mansion for the fourth time that day. Korra had tried to go there whenever she had had some free time, in between all the volunteering and helping the police, hoping she could finally see her friend after everything that had happened, but there had never been a trace of Asami, who had always called Mako, Bolin or their relatives to leave messages about coming later and not waiting up for her, but never even showed up to sleep in her own bed.  
Tenzin advised Korra to give Asami some space, but Korra couldn’t help but being worried, so she decided to look for her friend in the one place she could hide undisturbed from everyone: her office in the Future Industries Tower. Asami Sato was known to be a hard-core workaholic who would often drown her worries and sorrows in enormous piles of blueprints and new projects for who-knows-what new technological devilry. It was almost as if her productivity came out of a desperate need to distract herself from inner turmoil, and Korra knew that this time would be no exception. She could picture the black-haired woman in her head, covered in paperwork with ruffled hair and dark circles under her bottle-green eyes, scribbling and sketching frantically before giving in to the urge to cover herself in motor oil to build and fix things.  
With a takeaway box from Narook’s Seaweed Noodlery in one hand and a bag of fresh clothes in the other, Korra, followed by Naga, finally arrived at the entrance of the massive abandoned white skyscraper. She looked up to the Tower, feeling slightly dizzy at its height above her; then she took a deep breath and summoned all of her strength and courage before entering the building, knowing that the elevator was probably out of service. But it wasn’t the inhumane amount of stairs she’d had to climb that scared her the most. As she gulped down her bad feeling, Korra knew that she would be unprepared and helpless for whatever she would find in Asami’s office, but the Avatar also knew that she had no other choice but to go in there and do whatever was in her power to help the woman she loved.  
“Come on, Naga” she braced herself, “let’s do this”.  
\----  
“Asami? You in there?” Korra hollered through the empty hallways. The echo of her voice rumbled across the rooms like a tidal wave on a deserted beach. “Asami?”  
No one answered. The only sound she could hear was Naga’s panting and sniffing. Korra kept walking and calling, even though the emptiness of the building gave her the creeps, nevertheless she kept on moving until she found the door to Asami’s office.  
It was ajar, foreshadowing the possibility of somebody’s presence. Korra told Naga to wait for her outside; she then leaned in and knocked delicately, as not to disturb or startle anybody.  
“Hello? Somebody there?”  
The office was covered in the dim-light of the late evening and reeked of stale air. It was hard to tell if the mess came from the commotion of the battle or it was simply the by-product of Asami’s brainstorming; either way, the place looked like an active war zone. On the carpeted floor lied scattered around a bunch of blueprints and plans, some of them angrily crumpled up and thrown in distant corner, probably as a result of displeasure or frustration. There were also opened books and a consistent number of pens and pencils, some of them used as bookmarks in between pages. On the wooden desk at the centre of the room, stood a faint knobby candle which was supposed to compensate the lack of electricity that had not yet been restored in that part of the city - it was definitely doing a poor job.  
Korra squinted her eyes in order to see and felt a throb to her chest when she recognized the messy silhouette crouched down onto the desktop.  
“Asami?”  
There she was. No scribbling, no sketching, despite all the mayhem around her. She was sitting perfectly still, with her arms crossed and her head hidden in between them, as if she was poorly trying to hide from someone. At first Korra thought she might be asleep, but Asami quickly lifted her face from her little hideaway revealing big black bags under her swollen but very much awake eyes.  
“Korra?” Asami said weakly. Her voice was feeble as if she was trying to process the surprise, “What are you doing here?”  
Korra tiptoed across the room, trying not to step on any important document, and laid the box and the bag on the table in front of Asami. She could see in her restless face how broken and exhausted she was. Who knows how much sleep she got, those days. She probably barely ate.  
“We brought you some food and some clean clothes” Korra nodded in Naga’s direction. The polar dog’s big head took a sneak peek inside the half-opened door, as to say hi. “I thought you might need them”  
“Thanks, Korra” Asami replied, standing up from her chair “that’s very thoughtful of you”.  
“Don’t thank me, it was all Naga’s doing. I’m merely accompanying her” Korra joked, trying to cheer Asami up.  
“Well... thank you, Naga” Asami said, while the polar dog crossed the room with slow big steps to reach the two women “you really shouldn’t have troubled yourself”.  
“You’re kidding. Mako’s grandma basically sent us here, I had no choice!” was the Avatar’s scoffing answer. Of course, Korra hadn’t been sent by anyone, and had very much gone on her own, against everyone’s advice, although she would’ve never admitted it.  
A little amused smile, tired but sincere, suddenly cracked up on Asami’s cherry red lips. Korra’s heart suddenly became a little lighter and warmer; when she saw her friend pat Naga’s big head, it made her feel a little more confident.  
“She’s worried about you, you know” Korra said, with a sudden serious tone in her voice “We all are”.  
But Asami shook her head and shrugged her shoulders, as to belittle everyone’s concern.  
“There’s no need to, really” she mumbled, looking in another direction “I was just tinkering on some projects and prototypes... there was just some work to be done”.  
“You haven’t been home for days”.  
“I’m alright, really” the dark-haired woman insisted “Everything’s okay”.  
If Korra hadn’t known her friend any better, she probably would’ve fallen for it and believed her; but she knew Asami too well to oversee what she was trying to do. Being the daughter of an entrepreneur and having been around colleagues and partners her whole life, Asami Sato had learned from an early age how to present herself in public without showing any weakness or inner turmoil. She knew how to keep composure and not be overrun by her emotions, relying almost exclusively on her logic and common sense. On the outside, she always looked flawless and strong, as the CEO of the Future Industries should be. Only a few people had had the privilege to look beyond that mask and see the more emotional and intimate inner side of Asami.  
Even in that moment, between just the two of them, Asami was trying to hide her vulnerability, but Korra knew that this time, it was not to fool some potential business partner or untrustworthy person. She was hopelessly trying to fool herself.  
For a few moments, both women remained in an awkward silence. Asami was kneading nervously her left hand with her right thumb, as she broke eye contact with the blue-eyed girl, who was standing in front of her with a concerned look on her face. Korra, on the other side, felt her head filling up with things to say and scenarios of how every one of these things could go wrong. The more she looked at her friend, the more she worried.  
“Well, then...” Asami begun to say, but the fear of being sent away without even a chance to do something useful, made Korra blurt out the first thing that came to mind, interrupting the dark-haired woman mid-sentence.  
“W-what have you been working on?” she stuttered, trying to revive a conversation. The other woman sighed heavily.  
“Everything and nothing, I guess” she replied, meekly. “There is so much to do, and yet, I can’t get anything done. I can’t really focus”.  
“Why don’t you take a break?” Korra suggested “Get some fresh air, eat something. I’m sure you’ll feel better”.  
“I don’t know, I...”  
Without waiting for her answer to end, Korra took Asami’s hand and looked in her pale green eyes, trying to look convincing but not too pushy.  
“Come on, let’s get out of this stuffy place” she said softly “just for a bit”.  
Asami nodded and without letting go of her hand, she followed the Avatar up to the roof, like a tame little child led by her mother.  
\----  
The sun had completely gone down, leaving the city in a shade broken by the pale rays of the full moon. The air was starting to get chilly, but it was still thick with the warmth coming out of the concrete walls of the buildings that had been hit by the sun all day long. On the top of the Future Industries Tower, leaning on the large green lightning conductor, sat two women; one of them gulping down a mouthful of seaweed noodles, the other one swirling her chopsticks around inside the takeaway box.  
“Aren’t you hungry?” Korra asked, putting aside her empty carton “I’m pretty sure I heard your stomach growl”.  
Asami shrugged and sighed heavily.  
“When was the last time you ate?”  
“I don’t know” Asami confessed “I can’t remember”.  
Korra tried to get a grip and not to scold her. Being mad at someone was her way of showing that she cared, but Korra knew that it wouldn’t be productive, so instead she stayed calm and tried to reason with her friend.  
“Look, I don’t want to force you, but you need to eat something” Korra said “Starvation does not enhance your productivity, believe me”.  
Asami finally gave in and nodded in agreement; Then she picked out a bunch of noodles with her chopsticks out of the cardboard box and started to nibble on them like a little elegant rodent.  
“Atta girl” Korra chuckled softly, while the munching little urchin gave out a little vexed snort.  
Seeing her like this, so fragile and hurt, still trying to keep a composure, made Korra want to cry. She wasn’t used to this little vulnerable Asami, who seemed so helpless and abandoned, and she could only imagine what she was going through. First her mother, then her father, right after she started talking to him again... It was all so tragic. If she could only ease Asami of her pain, feel it in her stead... Korra wouldn’t have thought twice before doing it, not only because she owed her or because she was the Avatar, whose job was to help other people.  
Once she finished her food, Asami piled the empty box onto Korra’s and crouched down, putting her crossed arms on her knees.  
“Thank you, Korra,” she said softly.  
“Anytime”.  
Silence came upon them again, but this time, it was a more relaxed one. There were still some unsaid words between them, nevertheless, even without saying anything, it felt like Asami’s armour was starting to come off, allowing her to definitely drop the “everything’s fine” act. Korra, for her part, calmed down – mainly thanks to the noodles – and had come to terms with her anxious need to do something. She decided to give her friend the space she needed, without leaving her side and taking care of all the things Asami could not, starting with her self-care. No questions asked. She trusted that Asami would know when and if she wanted to talk to Korra about her feelings, without having to ask or pressure her into doing it. The only thing the Avatar had to do was being there for her, and that would be okay.  
Korra looked at the city, at least what was left of it in the aftermath. It looked very differently without street lighting, the blinking signs and the illuminated windows. It was as if the town had fallen in a profound sleep, an abnormal dormancy inside a cocoon of desolation and rubble, waiting to sprout and flourish again with the new-coming season. As her eyes went up to look at the moon and the starlit sky, Korra heard a muffled sniffling, so hushed that her tinnitus had almost drowned it out.  
She turned to her side and saw Asami becoming smaller and smaller, sobbing and burying her face in her crossed arms.  
“I-I just... I still can’t believe it,” she wept “It’s like he’s... he’s still there, in prison, waiting for me to play pai sho with him... And every time I remember that he’s not there anymore... that he’s... gone... I-I...”  
And then she burst out in an inconsolable crying, so loud and so broken, that the sound of it tore Korra’s heart to shreds. The Avatar scooted closer to the sob-shaking woman and put her arms around her. She caressed her ruffled black hair and held her tight, whispering to her softly.  
“It’s okay”.  
Asami bawled and buried her tear-wet face in Korra’s clavicle, clutching the short haired woman’s clothes and grinding her teeth in a desperate attempt to keep it together, even then, as if she feared she could explode from so much pain. Korra gently stroke her shuddering back and rubbed her own cheek on Asami’s midnight-coloured locks, as her mother used to with her when she was little.  
They stayed like this for hours, not minding the passing time, until Asami felt her eyes had run out of tears again.

Crying was tiresome.  
Asami realized that as soon as her mascara-smudged eyelids opened up again. She had just closed them to rest a bit, and soothe the burning and swelling, planning to nap just for a few minutes. Instead, she had fallen asleep like a log for who knows how long as soon as she had lain down on the sofa in her office. When Asami woke, the first rays of the dawn were breaking through the glass windows, tinting the walls and furniture in a strong egg-yolk-yellowish light. Beside her, beneath her fingers she felt the fuzz and warmth of Naga’s white fur, as the polar dog had curled up on the floor next to the couch, placing her large head exactly under Asami’s hand. The woman almost automatically moved her fingertips to tenderly scratch the dog’s floppy ears, who groaned satisfied in her sleep, annoying her owner’s sleep.  
“Naga...” Korra mumbled sluggishly. The girl was sitting on the floor, sound asleep, her body leaned back on the polar dog’s wide backside, her fingers intertwined on her stomach and her legs widely sprawled. Asami’s fingertips carefully wandered from Naga’s ear to the top of Korra’s head, in order to gently rub the Avatar’s brown hair. Without waking up, she grunted in delight.  
Asami slowly heaved herself up, and slid out of the sofa, gliding along the soft fabric. As her bare feet touched the ground, the woman stood still for a second, unable to recall her taking off her boots the night before. She had blurry memories of what had happened before she fell asleep: at some point, she had been too tired and worn out to be lucid.  
Korra must have taken them off of me, she thought as she caught a glimpse of her shoes neatly put together next to Naga’s tail, I think she might’ve even carried me down here.  
Asami snatched her boots and scampered silently across the office in order to get out and reach the rooftop.  
\---  
Leaning on the cold metallic rail of the rooftop, Asami felt how her whole body ached from the fatigue and the overwork. Her back and neck were stiff, her hands were all cramped up, her eyes still stung a bit, and her migraine hadn’t completely gone away yet. Every part of her hurt, but it wasn’t her physical condition that bothered her the most.  
The woman puffed out a grave sigh into the chilly morning air, taking in the profound silence of the unpeopled city for the first time since… since when? When was the last time she stood on the rooftop and did nothing but gazing at the view? Suddenly having nothing but time and rest seemed absurd, after all the ruckus she had been through in the past few weeks. Not that Asami Sato had ever led a slow life – she wasn’t the type of person who could sit around for long without doing something worthwhile – but the last events had had quite an impact on her, draining her strength as they never did before. After Korra had shown up again after three years and defeated Kuvira, Asami had thought she would feel relieved as soon everything was over. She had done so before, after every big battle she and her friends had overcome together. She had hoped to pull through and become soon her functional self again, stronger and wiser, after having let all the tension get out of her system. But there was one big thing she hadn’t calculated, and it was that one burden sitting on her soul and tormenting her sleep.  
Asami closed her pale green eyes. Her throat was choked up by a tight lump that never stopped being there, no matter how hard she tried to gulp it down. Her chest hurt all the time in a non-physical way and her mind felt utterly inoperative. She had tried so hard to come up with new ideas to develop some old projects to keep herself busy, but her brain was completely blank. Everything she had in her head and in her heart, every stronger emotion, every fear, every joy, every form of passion or enthusiasm, everything, was locked away. There was nothing but this dull pain that wouldn’t go away every time she thought of-- No, she couldn’t even bring herself to think of it.  
She had shut down and was somehow unable to switch her power back on. Or maybe she was too broken to do so. She felt absent most of the time, and it was almost as if she was watching herself from the outside, doing everything automatically like a robot and she couldn’t bear the sight of the mournful people around her. Everyone was trying to be respectful, some of them tried to take her mind off… that. Nothing worked. No one worked, and that was the reason she holed up in her office.  
To be useful. To do something. To stop lolloping around.  
To stop thinking about her father.  
\---  
Looking at the city, at all the buildings that were damaged or destroyed, Asami found herself admiring the landscape with new eyes. She had re-designed a good part of the streets after the portals to the Spirit World had been opened, so she had seen the topography and structure of Republic City so often she basically knew it by heart. It was her territory through and through, there was no doubting it. But that morning, Asami sensed that something in her perception of the city had changed forever, because she had realised that it wasn’t only hers.  
It had also been his.  
I love Republic City and I would do anything to save her. That’s what Hiroshi Sato had told the others when Chief Beifong had brought him to her office, the same office she had lain low for the past few days, the day he helped win the war against Kuvira. He loved Republic City and he loved Asami. That’s what he said.  
Goodbye, Asami.  
I love you.  
A sharp sting pierced through Asami’s heart as the lump in her throat tightened. These words, this voice. Her dad’s voice. He was still there, alive and carved in her memory: the tone of his voice, the smell of his clothes, the warmth of his firm embrace, the sound of his laughter, the feeling of his rough and bearded face on Asami’s cheek. Her anger towards him, her resentment when he had betrayed them. The gratitude in his old brown eyes when she pulled out the pai sho board. The newfound peace between them.  
Nothing had left. Every little part of Hiroshi Sato was still there, sculpted in his daughter’s brain and kept in a treasure chest she was too terrified to open.  
How could it be true? How could he feel so alive and well inside her, but not be in this world anymore? How could every place he had lived in, every step he had filled, every chair he had sat on suddenly be empty? How could everything he owned, not belong to anyone anymore? His glasses, his inventions, his office, his rooms, his daughter.  
It didn’t make any sense. Asami didn’t want it to make sense.  
She just wanted everything to stop.  
And yet all she could do was cry about it.  
\---  
“There you are”.  
Korra’s soft voice startled the brooding Asami, who was so sunken in her memories that she forgot the outer world. The sight of the blue-eyed Avatar standing behind her took Asami abruptly back to earth, dissolving all of her mind-wandering into thin air.  
“Here I am” Asami flushed, quickly sniffling with a half-hearted smile on her lips. “What brings you up to the rooftop?”  
Korra walked timidly up to her “I was just looking for you... I wanted to see if... well I don’t want to interrupt anything, I just...” she stammered, unsure of what to say. “Do you want me to leave? I get it if you want to stay alone...”  
Asami shook her head and invited Korra next to her with a nod. The girl followed the nonverbal offer and leaned on the rail close to Asami’s arm without touching it. Soon her cobalt gaze got lost in the wide landscape that stretched out before them.  
“It’s so quiet” she said, in a dreamy voice “I never thought I’d get to see it this way”.  
“Me neither” Asami commented, leaning a bit into Korra’s shoulder.  
The two women sighed in unison, letting the comfortable silence come again between them. Asami closed her eyes, soaking up the warmth and scent of Korra’s smooth skin. It wasn’t so much the smell or the texture as the tender comfort it gave her that made Asami feel like this was strangely familiar. It was like when she was little and had just lost her mother. When she had trouble sleeping, she would waddle to her father’s desk, where he would be sitting working late and scrabbling some ideas, to sit on his lap and cuddle up to him. She would listen to the steady beat of his heart and feel drowsy and safe. She would still miss her mom and she would still be scared of the men with the fire hands. Everything would still hurt, but that hug would always make it a little better.  
“It’s strange, isn’t it?” Asami asked, rubbing softly her cheek on Korra’s skin “He has been dead to me for four years... And now that he really is, I feel like he’s closer to me than he has ever been”.  
Korra sighed and wrapped the dark-haired woman in her arm, drawing her nearer by her side.  
“I...just can’t get my head around the fact that he... he won’t be there... on visiting day... that he’s...” Asami’s voice broke a little, as she was holding back tears, a fact which made her curse in annoyance.  
A surprised gasp slipped out of Korra’s lips.  
“I’m so sick of crying” Asami pouted, sniffling again and drying her smudged eyelids with the palm of her hand. “I’m sorry I’m such a mess”.  
But Korra squeezed her tightly “It’s okay. You have every right to be, you know”.  
Asami cleared her throat.  
“How is it possible that I couldn’t shed a single tear for days, but the moment you show up I can’t stop bawling my eyes out?”  
“I know. I’m a natural at making people cry” Korra answered, jokingly “That’s what makes me so charming”.  
Asami chuckled, feeling a little lighter, and snuggled up closer to Korra, searching with her ear the sound of her beating heart. She then closed her eyes and breathed slowly in and out.  
After a moment of hesitation, Korra broke the silence again.  
“There’s something I wanted to tell you,” she said, all serious and flushed. Asami looked up to Korra’s blue eyes, which were blinking more than usual.  
Korra continued in a stutter: “Despite all the bad things he’s done, I’ll always be thankful to Hiroshi... for, you know... helping us save the world... and I wished I could thank him for it... ”  
“Korra...” Asami tried to appease her; she didn’t need to say anything to comfort her, but Korra insisted on finishing.  
“But no matter how much I appreciate what he’s done for Republic City, which I do, a lot actually... nothing compares to my gratitude for him for being your dad... one of the two people that made you possible in the first place”.  
Asami felt her cheeks light up and the knot in her throat stiffen. Boiling tears rolled down her face without her being able to do anything to prevent it.  
I’m so proud of you, Asami. He had said to her. You are the greatest thing I ever created.  
“Oh no, I made you cry again” Korra stuttered, losing all of her built-up self-confidence in a matter of seconds. Before she could apologize, though, she found herself wrapped in Asami’s firm embrace, which she quickly reciprocated without feeling the need to add anything else to the conversation.  
The morning sun had risen high into the sky, waking up the people of Republic City and calling them to work. The world was slowly coming back to life, shyly blooming in all its colours, underneath the rubble and ruins of war, preparing for a new era of peace and change.  
It would take a lot of healing and adjustment before everything that still felt new and overwhelming to her would become the new normal. It would take a lot of time, Asami knew that.  
She would always carry her father’s memory in her heart - his words, his actions, his mistakes and his love for her. She would always be Hiroshi Sato’s daughter - and a part of her would always hurt at the thought of that. But she also knew that, no matter how big and uncontrollable a change might be, she would never be alone. There were people that loved and cared about her, and would never leave her side, not even in a moment like that. People like her friends. And as long as those people were there, there would always be a reason for her to get up and start all over again, to heal, to overcome her own heart-wrenching grief and look for beauty in whatever unknown and unpredictable future she’d might have to face. And as long as she had Korra by her side, she knew she would always have the courage and strength to do so.


End file.
